Loyola students culminate theatre season with one-act festival

Students from the Department of Theatre Arts and Dance at Loyola University New Orleans will round out the spring theatrical season with the Senior Project One-Act Festival on April 17, 18, 22 and 23, in Lower Depths Theater, located in the Communications/Music Complex on Loyola’s main campus. The one-act performances are produced and directed by seniors majoring in theatre arts.

The performances will all be held at 7 p.m. and are free and open to the public.

The April 17 and 18 performances include “The Zig-Zag Woman,” by Steve Martin, directed by Andrew De La Pena, from Kailua, Hawaii; “Not Not Not Not Not Enough Oxygen,” by Caryl Churchill, directed by Helen Hutka, from Austin, Texas; and “The Father Clock,” by Walter Wykes, directed by Patrick Anthony, from Georgetown, Texas.

The performances on April 22 and 23 are “The Game,” by Louise Bryant, directed by Shane Palmer, from Sierra Vista, Ariz.; “Dutchman,” by Amiri Baraka; directed by Brandon Sutton, of San Antonio, Texas; and “The Box,” by Daniel Owens, directed by Constance Thompson, from Saint Albans, N.Y.

Show descriptions:

“The Zig-Zag Woman” by Steve Martin
This charmingly contorted comedy finds the heroine physically displacing her heart from the rest of her body through a magician’s illusion, culminating in a celebration of mysterious tricks, irregular harmony and twisted love.

“Not Not Not Not Not Enough Oxygen” by Caryl Churchill
This dark and prophetic play depicts the possible environmental crisis our world could face in the future, where the natural world is falling apart, and humanity is faced with the option of either taking its own life or living with the repercussions of its own destructive greed.

“The Father Clock” by Walter Wykes
This peculiar and absurd one-act play depicts two actors who toil through alternating roles in an attempt to better understand their relationship to theatre and each other. Without direction however, they find their roles to be a little more complicated than the practice of their craft.

“The Game” by Louise Bryant
This four-character allegory is an English morality play with the characters of Death and Life vying with a toss of the dice for the lives of the nameless “The Youth,” a male poet, and “The Girl,” a dancer. Each of the two young people decide their life is not worth living for lack of love, but Life helps them both realize that what they had called love was really just desire.

“Dutchman” by Amiri Baraka
This 1964 Obie Award-winning play tells the story of Clay, a naïve young black man, who meets Lula, a flirtatious and emotionally bankrupt white female. The play focuses on the racial and sexual tension between the two, twisting and turning through periods of infatuation and disdain, ending in tragedy.

“The Box” by Daniel Owens
This play uses symbolism to connect African-Americans’ past to the present and addresses the complex issue of class identity amongst blacks. Three African-American youths are trapped in a box and forced to confront their sameness by a fourth character, an old man, who takes them back in time to face their past.

For more information, contact Patrick Gendusa, assistant professor of theatre arts at cpgendus@loyno.edu or call 504-865-2835.

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